John Scalzi is at it again. His tongue-and-cheek categorization of "real world" deals, a poke at Publishers Lunch (which impressed me in large part because I confess I've read exactly 2 paragraphs of Publishers Lunch; it's eye-glazingly boring, and transmits not a lot of useful information. Well, to be fair, not a lot in the paragraphs that I managed to take in the single time I tried) seems to have caused a bit of annoyance.

Pub Lunch is useful for those who work in publishing, but I'd never call it required reading for aspiring writers. I'm astonished anyone outside the industry would bother to subscribe to it.

I ran into it as a Strongly Suggested Resource on someone or other's blog (yes, this is my lame memory kicking into gear, why do you ask?), and I was curious. So... I joined up and somehow get both the Daily Lunch and the Weekly Lunch in my in box. I can sort of see how this might be of general use to someone working in publishing -- but given the non-event which is the actual dollars for any of the deals, I can't see how it would be enormously useful; it will give you an idea of what's being acquired, yes, but I imagine PW does that as well, and everyone is already reading that.

I'm not in publishing, so I could be so very wrong about this, but I find Lunch a tedious. I think that writers read it to get a sense of whose selling what -- or I think that's what the original point of the poster who raved about how useful it was, was.

Addenda (because I'm so allergy-laden, my brain is numb and I'm rubbing my eyes too much to see the screen):

Whenever anyone in the business tells me something is indispensible, my first impulse is to go and try it. Whatever it is. This leads to some amusing things and some very very stupid things, but it's just a compulsion <g>.

I agree that Lunch is probably not of great use to aspiring writers, or even new ones. It's obviously of use as satirical fodder for those who've been kicking around -- or kicked around, depending on who you ask -- the business.

I actually see Pub Lunch more as a tool for publishers - a way of creating early buzz for a new title with the trade. (Publicists and agencies are much more likely to send in the announcements than actual editors.) So in that sense I could see you reading it more as a bookseller and less as a writer.

As a mktg person, I mostly read it out of curiosity to see what other presses are going to be giving major pushes in the future. And when it comes to creating buzz, exact dollar amounts matter less than the general category.

Or rather, the books that were being sold weren't anything I could ever imagine writing -- I'm very insular, so far, and understand the genre of SF/F better than many, but that's probably because of my famous over-focus.

Which makes LOCUS, with its slightly closer to real figure deals, more useful for -me-, although not for people who are writing across a broad spectrum.

But now that you've posted this, I'll try it again when the plants have stopped sporing for a few minutes -- because it is not, in fact, a bad idea to keep an open mind. Mine sometimes needs a crowbar to achieve this...

Amen to that. I'm biased, but I think that Locus is a great industry aid. For People & publishing alone. The upcoming books and news are also good. I tend to skip the review 'cause I don't have the money to stay in the new books. Interviews are fun.